


A Cop and a Forensic Tech in Her Batcave

by completelyhopeless



Series: Detective Grayson and Forensic Batgirl [1]
Category: DCU
Genre: Alternate Universe, Comment Fic, Community: comment_fic, F/M, Gen, Pre-Relationship, case fic almost
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-25
Updated: 2014-12-25
Packaged: 2018-03-03 14:07:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2853548
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/completelyhopeless/pseuds/completelyhopeless
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sent down to the "batcave," rookie Detective Grayson meets forensic tech Barbara Gordon. She reluctantly teams up with him to work a case.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Cop and a Forensic Tech in Her Batcave

**Author's Note:**

> For the prompt: _[DCU, Barbara Gordon/Dick Grayson, Dick is a detective and Babs is a csi, together they have to work to solve a case](http://comment-fic.livejournal.com/196291.html?thread=42088643#t42088643)_
> 
> First time I saw this, I was like, "that's an awesome idea, I love it." Then I went, "oh, I can't fill that. I could never get into CSI."  
> And then I was looking at prompts again and said, "well, I liked NCIS, and I could see Babs in Abby's position and Dick in Tony's, and I could write that, maybe." And I remembered the picture Kate drew of Abby as a bat, and that was almost that, but I still hesitated. I like writing for Dick, but I'm not sure my characterization is at all accurate, and I fear it's worse with Barbara.
> 
> Still, after the idea of Tony and Abby's roles passed with the prompter, I gave it a go. I didn't intend to go this AU with it when I first started, but Dick started filling in his backstory and it wasn't quite the one I knew. Turns out the theme was AU, so that works. Still... Next thing I know, it's over 3000 words long and could go on for a lot longer if I do the whole case. So I kind of panicked a bit and said, "maybe I should end this here, even though it's not really an ending."
> 
> So I am still locked in a debate with myself about going further with this.

* * *

“Go down to the batcave.”

Dick stopped, frowning. This had to be another one of their initiation rites, and he was getting sick of it. Being the “rookie” left him open to all sorts of harassment, and he was tired of it. None of them looked past the fact that he was new, assumed that he was fresh out of the academy and had never done a day of work in his life, just some college kid with no experience at all.

They wouldn't respect the nightschool degree, wouldn't think anything of the broken down ex-cop that had been saddled with him after his parents died. Dick didn't care. He didn't think much of his so-called superior officers.

“Grayson, you deaf?”

He had been, once, for a while. Surgery had fixed it, but he'd learned to read lips and sign, both skills he kept to himself most of the time. People underestimated him. He was used to that. He even preferred it. Watching had gotten him a hell of a lot farther than direct confrontation, though he knew a thing or two about that, too.

“What do you want?”

“I told you to go down to the batcave. Get that weirdo tech to give you the forensics and get back up here with them yesterday.”

Dick leaned back in his chair. “One, we're not partners. Two, you don't actually outrank me. Three, I don't take orders from you.”

“You want to solve this case or not?”

He would have said not, but Dick did, actually, want to catch this killer and make sure he paid for what he'd done. Still, he picked up his coffee and took a long, slow sip of it before he rose, leaving his desk and the jerks around him behind for the batcave, whatever the hell that was.

* * *

“I swear, Kowlinski, if you cross that doorway, I will fill your car and your home full of every one of those bats that scare you so much and watch you cry like the baby you are.”

“Now that I want to see,” Dick said. “Do I need tickets or will there be a recording posted later? Please tell me there's a recording. I'd pay for that.”

The redhead bent over the mass spectrometer stood straight, frowning as she looked over at him. He waited, wondering what it took to pass her inspection. She didn't seem like the type it was easy to please. “Kowlinski send you to do his dirty work?”

“I don't work for Kowlinski,” Dick told her, leaning against the counter and getting a glare from her as he did. “I figure he was hoping I'd get a bit of what you're planning for him, but that's a bit far for rookie hazing, isn't it?”

She shrugged. “I wouldn't know. Some of us use our brains instead of other useless pieces of anatomy, and because we do, we don't need to try and measure our success by our dick size.”

“I'd win. Five foot ten.”

She frowned, taking off her glasses and rubbing them on her lab coat. He didn't catch the first part she muttered, but he doubted it was flattering. “That makes no sense.”

He smiled, holding out a hand to her that she didn't take. “Richard Grayson. Most people call me Dick, and not with affection.”

She fought a smile after that, turning back to her machine. “What brings you down, Grayson?”

“Oh, come on. You're brave enough to call me Dick. Or is that against the rules of the batcave?”

“Rule one of the batcave—”

“Don't talk about the batcave?”

She leaned back against the counter, almost in the same pose as him, and he smiled at her, knowing he was pushing things, but he liked pushing things. “They tell you why they call this the batcave?”

“I'm assuming it's because it's an underground forensic lab and they never grew up so they think it's creepy. It could do with a bit of redecorating, but it's not bad. A few homey touches here and there and it could be something straight out of _Better Homes and Gardens.”_

“Why hasn't Kowlinski shot you yet?”

“He's afraid of the paperwork.”

She did laugh that time, and Dick grinned, knowing he'd won in getting that from her. He didn't think many people managed to get her to laugh. “You didn't answer my question. Why are you here?”

“I'd say something about never being too busy to flirt with a beautiful woman, but I'd rather not be dismembered and left where no one will ever find me without any forensics to connect my killer to me even if I was found,” he answered, and then caught himself yawning, the last forty-eight hours catching up to him again. He needed more coffee. “No, truth is, I need anything you can tell me about Elizabeth Anders.”

“I'm still running tests.”

“I said I'd take anything,” he reminded her. “We both know Kowlinski is the kind of cop who will botch this case and not even care because she was just some girl working the streets and streetwalkers aren't people to him. He doesn't care about a dead hooker.”

“And you do?”

“Hey, I grew up in the circus. My uncle was the bearded lady. Who am I to judge?”

She handed him a file—mostly, he suspected, to get him the hell out of her batcave. “This isn't a case where your answer's going to be easy to find. The crime scene was contaminated, and even if it wasn't, there's a lot of this city to comb through just because of where she was found and the kind of work she did.”

“And yet you managed to find the one piece that didn't fit.”

She eyed him suspiciously. He wasn't really flattering her—he could tell she had something and he didn't think she liked sharing her information with strangers or before she had all the pieces. In the end, she relented. “Not exactly. I can't tell you who put that fiber on her coat or if it actually came from her killer. I just told you what kind of coat he might have been wearing.”

“Yeah, but it's still something. How many Armani suits drive down to that kind of red light district for their kind of fun? Expensive suits might mean an expensive car, and that is something I can hunt down. Or I suppose I could go talk to everyone who owns an Armani suit.”

She shrugged. “You wanted a needle.”

“Actually, just the haystack,” he said, smiling at her again. “Thanks. Next time I'll bring something for the bats.”

“What?”

“Can't be a batcave without them, and I'm sure you're the only one that feeds them, so they might enjoy having a treat for once,” he said, tempted to throw in a flip and a bow as he left the lab. 

He could hear Bruce's voice in his head. _One of these days, Dick, you'll have to learn to get along with your coworkers._

 _What, like you, Bruce?_ Dick had thrown that in his mentor's face a few too many times. That was half the reason they didn't speak much these days. He shook his head as he pushed the button for the elevator.

He had a creep in a suit to find.

* * *

“Waste of your time, kid.”

Dick let out a breath, looking over at the P.I. and shaking his head. “Are you ever going to stop checking up on me? I know you know how old I am. We had a huge fight when I turned twenty-one.”

Bruce grunted, ignoring Dick's words, as usual. Some days, he wasn't sure where it all went wrong. He used to be the best junior partner Wayne Investigations ever had, and he loved nothing more than spending his time with Bruce on one of his cases. The schools had hated it, but it was one of the best childhoods he could ask for, especially after what happened to his parents.

“It's not, actually,” Dick said, leaning back and stretching his sore muscles. “Not a waste of my time, I mean. The forensics didn't give me much more than an expensive suit—not yet, anyway, I think the tech was holding back—but a few hours of watching got me that.”

“You can't assume that car belongs to your fancy suit.”

“Cop instinct,” Dick said, throwing that back at him, too. “She was a streetwalker. He doesn't figure she was worth his time or his money. He didn't care that he killed her. He barely saw her as a warm body, definitely didn't see her as a person.”

“Instincts only take you so far. You need proof, and you can't assume that every rich man lacks respect for his fellow man.” Bruce looked at him, fully in lecture mode. “You're also an officer of the law now. You took on the badge and the shield, and you have rules to follow. Procedures. You have to get your evidence the lawful way.”

“Relax, Bruce. I know how to play by the book.” Dick smiled. “I just prefer rewriting the book when it suits me.”

“Dick—”

“The chat's been lovely, but I need to go down to the batcave again.”

* * *

The rookie was not only back, he was filling a bowl full of birdfood and putting it in her window. Barbara pulled off her glasses and pinched her nose, trying to make her headache go away before he made it worse.

“Batcave,” she reminded him, annoyed. “They're not birds. You can't just put bird food out and assume that it's okay.”

“You didn't say if they were vampire or fruit. I went with fruit, but if they're not, well, I think they're on their own,” he said, turning around with one of his smiles and ignoring everything she'd just said. She shook her head, not sure why she'd been cursed to deal with Kowlinski _and_ Grayson. It was like some kind of nightmare, and she had enough of those without two jerk cops to deal with.

“What do you want, Grayson? If I had more information for you, I'd tell you.”

“I may have something for you,” he said, pulling out a tablet and removing the storage card from it, passing it over to her. “You think you can tie this car to anything else we might find? Carpet fibers, tire marks, bits of glass, anything at all?”

She frowned. “Do you have any idea what I do down here?”

“The sort of thing private investigators wish they could do,” he answered with a grin, popping the card in her computer and pulling up the picture. “That car belongs to a suit that's known to come down for his... entertainment. Also known for roughing up the prostitutes he hires and refusing to pay if he's not completely satisfied.”

She eyed him suspiciously. “What do you need me for if you got all that?”

“They only know him as the Suit. I managed to trace the car back through five shell companies already, but he's careful. Covers his tracks too well. Witnesses have seen him down in the area, but none of them are willing to say so for court, and at least one of the traffic cams is broken. I noticed that on my way back.” He leaned against the desk. “Is there anything in what you have that could have come from that car?”

“That's not the way it works. I'm supposed to give you possibilities that you can narrow down from, not match up with a suspect you've already got in mind. I'm not going to frame anyone,” she told him, about ready to throw him out of her lab.

“That what Kowlinski does?”

“Maybe. Don't get any ideas that you are better than him.”

Grayson snorted. “Too late for that. I already know I'm a better man. And a better cop. Sadly, I'm even a better human being. So was the tiger at the circus. You don't have to like me, Batgirl, and I know you don't trust me or you would have given me everything you had the last time I was here. Can we call a truce long enough to get this girl's killer?”

“You call me Batgirl and want a truce?”

He studied her. “If you hate the nickname so much, why haven't you done something to Kowlinski yet? That's all he ever calls you. I thought about calling you Doctor Gordon, but somehow, even with all those degrees you have, it doesn't fit you. Thought about calling you Babs, but I figured I liked living more.”

She folded her arms over her chest. She didn't want to like him. True, he wasn't Kowlinski. Grayson seemed smarter, behind all that _aw, shucks_ charm and he seemed to have a handle on all aspects of the case that most of the boys upstairs lacked.

“Almost forgot,” he said, reaching for his bag and taking out a thermos. He held it out to her. “Food for the bats, coffee for the forensic goddess.”

She didn't take it. “Don't bother flirting. Or flattering. I'm immune. Find your badge bunnies elsewhere.”

He laughed. “Babs, if I was flirting with you, you'd know it. This is just a token of my appreciation for all that you do that I wouldn't begin to understand because I don't have the background in science that you do. I've got instincts and guts, but they don't mean as much as they used to in this world.”

She took the thermos that time, remembering that she'd ran out of coffee hours ago and hadn't made it to the cafeteria since the day before. She poured herself a small sample and looked at him. “Should I run this through the mass spec first?”

“Only if you want to insult Alfred.”

“Alfred?”

“Long story,” Grayson answered. “Simplest explanation is that he helped raise me after my parents died. He still likes me, and he would never hurt a lady. He really did his best to teach me good manners. It never took like it should have.”

She sipped cautiously, watching him.

“And you could stop pretending that you didn't look me up,” he went on. “I figured you knew all along, but when you made that remark about framing, I knew you did. Yes, I was raised by Bruce Wayne. Yes, I learned everything I know from him, and no, he never framed anyone but they threw him off the force anyway.”

She shrugged. She'd wanted to know if Grayson was telling the truth about growing up in the circus, and it hadn't taken much to find out. She needed to know what she was up against, and she'd always preferred to have as much information as she could. She knew the rumors about Wayne's suspension, but she'd heard them before, back when her father was commissioner.

“Why Batgirl?”

“Because I was the only one who _didn't_ scream like a girl when the one that had taken up residence here got scared out of its nest. Kowlinski tried to shoot it. I saved it.” She looked at him. “Why'd you join the dark side?”

He laughed. “You sound like Bruce. Being a cop wasn't about punishing him or saying they were right. It was about having the resources to do the right thing for a change. Too many of the people we found got away with it because neither Bruce or I had a badge. Now I do.”

“You have a noble streak.”

“I know. It surprises _everyone,”_ he said with another grin. “So... you gonna tell me what you found?”

“Maybe.”

* * *

Barbara had already changed her mind about Dick by the next time she saw him in her lab. He wasn't a frat boy with a noble side that surfaced every now and again. He was the sort that got chewed up and spit out in this business. She didn't know how long it would be before he went back to being a private citizen, his idealism crushed by the limits of his badge and the flaws in the system. Even in the batcave she heard things—she heard too much—and she knew that the rookie had managed to alienate himself from the rest of the force, even the captain, and given his history with Wayne, it wouldn't be long before he was in for his own IA investigation. Kowlinski would be leading the charge.

She hated to see him win, but she didn't think Grayson stood much of a chance against him.

Or anything at the moment. He was dripping wet, rain puddling under him in her lab, and she would have smacked him if the first words out of his mouth weren't, “Another girl is dead.”

She drew in a breath and let it out, thinking. She could respond any number of ways, but she didn't need her ability to hack to know that Dick's decision to become a cop wasn't just about wanting a badge. He'd had some kind of falling out with his mentor. She didn't know that he had anyone else to talk to, and even though he was younger than her, he looked older right now.

“Kowlinski doesn't think they're connected. It's not like they were killed with the same weapon or dumped in the same spot, so I can almost see his point, but he's wrong. It's the same guy. I know it.”

She thought the same thing, but she couldn't prove it. None of the forensics matched up, the girls were never killed in the same way twice, but this guy had a prowling ground, and he was careful about what he left behind. This wasn't the work of an amateur. This guy had practice killing, and he was only getting better at it while Kowlinski did nothing. 

She eyed Grayson again. His problem was that he cared too much, and if she started him down this road, he'd care even more than he already did. “When was the last time you slept?”

“I should ask the same of you,” he muttered, pushing back his dripping hair. “The answer to your question is that I don't know. If I'd fallen asleep at my desk, Kowlinski would have drawn on me, so I'm thinking I didn't.”

He coughed, ruining his joke, and she rolled her eyes at him before going into her office and grabbing the sweatshirt off the coat rack. She'd kept it there ever since she made the office hers. “Here. Change your shirt at least. I don't need you dying in my lab. You'll contaminate my samples.”

“You're all heart, Babs,” he said, but he yanked off his coat and t-shirt. Her eyes went to the deep slash that covered most of his chest, and he dragged her father's shirt down over it when he saw her looking at it. “You got somewhere to put these while they dry?”

“Over there.”

He nodded, putting the jacket and shirt on the other counter, under the air vent. He pulled the cuffs of the shirt over his hands—her father might not have been as muscular as him, but he was still taller. “I can't believe you trust me enough to give me your father's shirt but not let me in on the evidence you've found. Are you kidding me?”

“Dick,” she said, making her voice as gentle as she could. “There's no going back from this.”

He snorted. “If I wanted safe, I wouldn't be a cop.”

She faced him, taking off her glasses. “I don't think the girl you found was the first victim. I think there's been at least a dozen others. I can't prove it, haven't been able to link them any more than where they were found and what they did for a living, but I think the same guy did it.” 

He didn't even take a minute to digest that. “Give me everything you have.”

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, it's a series now. I'll try and make it a real case fic. This is probably a bad idea.


End file.
